May 4 Outing: Kinetic Sculpture Race

Photos: Mike L Washington

Come join us for an annual Baltimore tradition! May 4th. The American Visionary Arts Museum (AVAM) hosts the Kinetic Sculpture Race around the streets and parks of the inner harbor and Patterson Park, with various obstacle courses along the way. The event is rain or shine and lasts most of the day. It may require some good health and endurance for those who want to cover the entire event.  Meet at 9am at the AVAM parking lot, between the back of American Visionary Arts M(AVAM) and Federal Hill. That is the staging area, ceremony and race start. It’ll be crowded, so Mike will be by “Tic-Toc Crock”, you’ll know it when you see the vehicle. 

The pre-race ceremony and start of the event at the AVAM offers a lot of fun and opportunities to photograph the vehicles and their brightly costumed crews and the race from several vantage points around the AVAM, including Federal Hill and Key Highway. For the hardy photographer, you may wish to hop in you car and find parking in the neighborhood of Canton, then hike over to Canton Waterfront Park to photo the contestants paddle their contraptions around the pier to prove their sea worthiness. You can then follow the parade up to Patterson Park to witness the obstacle corses of plowing their craft through a sand pit, then uphill through a groomed and mucky mud corse. After they hose themselves and their transportation off, they reassemble at the pagoda observatory to parade down E.Pratt Street to return, via downtown, to the AVAM for the finish (around 4:00pm) and party for the participants.

This year's race route and start times have not yet been published. In past years the race, itself, starts around 10am, with pre-race activities and ceremony at 9:00 am. We will update, as information becomes available.

Click here for the Baltimore Kinetic Sculpture Race Website